After Joe had left the cabin, Etta started working on efforts towards gaining her freedom. More than anything else, it was important to keep a clear head. No panic. Step one was to get her arms free. To his credit, Joe had truly been a nice guy, perhaps too nice of a guy. He didn’t know that she’d been taking self-defense classes. She had known that if he left her alone, she could get out of the duct tape restraints. She raised her arms above her head and pulled her forearms quickly down to her thighs, pulling them apart with all her might, using the force of the swing to assist in breaking the tape. She felt the pull of the tape against her wrists, but still the adhesive held tight. One more time and she’d be free. She tried the maneuver Keith had her practice in class again and this time her arms pulled apart, breaking the duct tape along its cloth seams, exactly as intended. Cheap stuff.
Okay. Next step was to get free from the cabin. She remembered one simple truth Keith had mentioned in class: The easiest way to get out of something locked was to have someone unlock it. Keep it simple. There was the option of breaking one of the windows, then crawl out and maybe cut her foot on the glass. It really was too bad she didn’t have shoes. In that, Joe had been smart. If she wanted to be tracked, well, that would do it. She’d bleed and maybe be able to get the glass out, but she no longer wanted to be tracked from here on. No, it would be better if she could get Owen to unlock the door, then disable him with a surprise attack. And the skillet on the stove was a great weapon. After all, those things weighed a ton. What would be the best place to wait for him?
What would Owen see when he got there? He’d be alerted that there was no car where he expected to find Joe’s waiting for him. He’d be on guard then that something was wrong, wouldn’t he? She needed to cover the windows. He couldn’t look in and see that she was waiting for him. But what could she cover the windows with? What did she have? The extra towels? No, there wasn’t enough of them. Aha, the papers on the back wall. She pulled the papers from the clipboards on the back wall, then pulled out lengths of duct tape to tape them together as makeshift “curtains” for the windows. She’d barely have enough, but she thought there was enough to block most of the view to the inside. She continued tearing off duct tape to tape the paper up to the windows.
God knew how long it would be before Owen got there. She needed to hurry. But she was so intensely tired. She needed to get a little rest before Owen arrived. She’d wait behind the door, then when she heard the keys in the padlock, she’d get up and haul the skillet over her head and bean him in the head with it when he walked through the door. No, not enough. She’d need to tie him up afterwards, while he was out. Then she could find his keys and steal his own car to get back to freedom. Hey, this wasn’t really a bad plan.
She grabbed the bag from the stove and the skillet. She drank down another of the water bottles, held the frying pan between her knees and leaned back on the wall to wait for Owen. She kept the bag with her, knowing that she’d need the two leftover bottles of water when she took off running. If she was going to make it to civilization, she’d need water to survive. She leaned her head back and thought of Tom and how desperately she wanted to see him again, if only for five minutes, to feel his body against hers just one more time, to kiss his lips and look into his eyes. Thoughts of him brought her comfort. In only minutes she drifted off to sleep where she sat.
She awoke with a start when she heard loud thumps on the small boardwalk that led up to the little shack. It was much darker now. It was obviously night out now. God knew how long she’d been sleeping. As she suspected, there was a pause as she heard someone walk around towards the window of the little cabin nearest the wall where she stood. Then she heard the footsteps again back at the door and the obvious sound of keys jingling in the padlock. She lifted up the skillet above her head, waited for the door to open and let the outline of the man walking in the doorway take one step, two into the doorway. His eyes would need to adjust to the darkness. She waited to hear him turn to close the door slightly then pulled the skillet from right to left with all the force she had in her body at Owen’s approximate height. She heard a sharp cracking noise, then saw the shape slump over and fall to the floor of the cabin, hitting his head against the far stainless-steel vat on the way down. Oh God. Maybe she killed him.
She threw the skillet over towards the stove, stooped over and checked his carotid pulse. No, he was still alive, which meant that he was dangerous. She needed to restrain him and quickly. She went back to her goodie bag behind the door, grabbed the duct tape. She was rolling him over when she heard a deep moan from him. She started to wrap the duct tape around his wrists behind his back, when Owen sat up abruptly, pulled arms apart from behind him and tackled her at her knees, ramming her head against the larger vat behind her. She felt a sharp pain against the back of her head and Owen’s hands pulling at her legs, which were sweaty with perspiration. Since she was barefoot, she was able to easily pull her legs from beneath his arms. She sprang up and ran through the open doorway as fast as she could. She was on her own now, barefoot with only a tank-top and running shorts, no water and no idea where she was. But he was injured. Not fatally injured, but she could feel the blood he’d gotten on her when he’d tried to grab her.
He’d be coming after her. And he’d be angry.
She ran up the ridge past the shack, away from the direction where they’d walked into the glen from the car. She made it to the top of the rise and saw another glen, with a gentle creek running along through it. She thought it would be too obvious to run along the creek, so she ran towards the top of the next rise at the opposite side of the next valley. There were more pine trees in this section. From her time in the woods with Tom, she knew that pine trees were an excellent way to mask yourself. Small animals used the lower branches to mask themselves all the time. She’d make her way under one of those pines across the way and hide out from Owen until it was light enough to see her way to civilization. And she was ungodly tired. Hopefully Owen would be tired from his skirmish and injuries now too. She had to keep running until she was too tired to run anymore. Hopefully Owen would give up, knowing she wasn’t going to be easy prey.
* * *
There was a large map of the Springbrook Nature Center rolled out on Gen’s kitchen table. Bill Meyers, Etta’s father and Tom were reviewing every aspect of the place. Bill lifted a coffee mug to his lips, then put it down again to anchor one of the corners of the map. “After you called, I ran a property check for all parcels adjacent to Springbrook. You were absolutely right, Tom. This section here ….” He pointed to an entire section of land next to the North entrance of Springbrook, an entirely fenced in wilderness preserve. “…this is owned by Randall’s father. Bought it about ten years ago, presumably for good hunting.”
“Yeah, I kinda remember hearing something about that. Something about fish in a barrel,” Tom responded.
“Since this whole investigation is now out of my hands,” Bill said, pointing his thumb at the FBI agents that were at this point having a discussion with Gen in her former dining room, “I can’t really make it an official search without going through the feds. But I can get you deputized, Tom, and we can go in there for a look-see. I’ve briefed Agent Hanlon on everything up to this point, including your hunch about Springbrook. And he’s right. It is a hunch, but it’s a good hunch and it deserves a follow-through. So we’ll do that.” He lifted his mug of coffee again and took a deep swig. “So you know this area really well?”
“Yeah, we went through most of it when we were in scouts. Pretty much had our run of the place. It’s big, but I remember most of it, I think. I’m sure some things have changed.”
“Yeah, I’m sure they have. Any buildings onsite?”
“Not many. Mainly the main office areas, an interpretive center, you know, that kind of thing. I seem to remember there were a couple of little shacks towards the back entrance for, you know, processing syrup in the spring or something. I’d think they maybe aren’t there anymore, but, if they were, they’d be an excellent out-of-the way spot for this kind of thing.”
“Okay. That makes sense and if they’re at the back of the property, then that correlates with Randall’s holdings. Let’s start there at first light tomorrow. We’ll put together some gear, drive over there tonight then make our way out at the break of dawn.”
Tom opened his mouth to complain but found it fell on deaf ears. Bill raised his hand up towards Tom, in a stop-sign gesture. “Save your griping. There’s no point searching in the dark. It’s too dangerous. We don’t know the area that well, for all we know these folks are armed and somebody could get hurt.” Tom reluctantly nodded his head in agreement. “I’ll get you deputized. You can be armed with a knife or something, but I’m not going to give you a sidearm. It’s just too dangerous.” He raised his hand again. “No arguments or you don’t go along at all.” He placed both hands on the table and leaned towards Tom. “I understand you’re worried. You’ve got to stifle it for now. I need you since you know the lay of this land and need you to have a clear head. Can you do that?” “Yeah, I can do that.”
“Good. Let’s grab some grub for the road, some canteens of water. If we find her, she’s likely to need some medical attention and be dehydrated. Let’s prepare for the worst and hope for the best, okay?” Bill came around the table, slapped Tom on the back and propelled him towards the back kitchen door. “Let me check in one last time with the feds. I’ll be right out to the squad so we can get going.”
Glen Staley walked up to Bill Meyers, who was almost a good foot taller and a great deal more forbidding of stature. “Bring back my daughter, Deputy.”
Bill laid his hand on the smaller man’s shoulder, “If she’s there, I’ll do my very best, sir. We both will do everything in our power.”
* * *
Etta had run hard, as far as her weary legs could carry her. She felt a burning in her side, an intense pain that stung deep inside her, but she kept going. Consider this a marathon, Etta. No pain, no gain. Oh that was a stupid saying, wasn’t it? Who thought up that crap? She pulled another piece of the receipt she held in her pocket out and dropped it on the ground as she ran. Hopefully Tom would follow her bread-crumbs, but Owen wouldn’t be that smart. The dumb ass. That’s it. Keep your mind off the pain and just keep going. Use your anger. Get away, as far away as possible. Yet, every time she came over a rise, there seemed to be nothing but more forest and woods beyond. This place must be huge.
She saw a slight clearing to her left with some kind of man-made something standing in the clearing. Was that a wall? She needed to get away from there. That much clearing would make it way too easy to be seen. There was a lineup of pine trees, five or six trees-deep to her right and going down as far as the eye could see. She needed to rest and she needed it badly. She’d make one of those her home. She stopped for a second and couldn’t see or hear anybody in any direction around her. Maybe Owen had given up and gone away. Right. Not with her luck.
She ran over to the stand of pines, grabbing random pine branches as she ran, hauling them with her about ten trees down and three trees back from the relative open area under the deciduous tree area. She crawled under a rather large pine branch, then began making a camouflaged nesting area under the branches, filling in blank spaces with the branches she’d gathered as she’d been running. This is what a bunny would do. She’d sit under there, hiding from Owen. And if God were with her, she’d be safe for a while.
She heard him yelling through the woods, calling out her name, with the occasional curse as she wrapped herself into as small of a ball as possible and tried to slow down her breathing. Her heaving breaths were only exacerbating the pain in her chest. She heard him call out again, “Etta, God dammit, I was only going to kill you. Now I’ll rape you first, you slutty whore.” Yeah, he was angry. Yet his voice was still fairly far away. She could barely make out what he was saying. And he had to need medical attention. She reached back to the back of her head and felt the pain as her fingers found a fairly small, certainly less than an inch-long gash in her head. The bleeding seemed to have stopped while she was running, yet she could feel her hair was matted with blood. She needed help too and soon.
* * *
There was a knocking at Gen’s back door. Glen answered the knocking and opened the main door to find Peggy and her mother, Martha, standing on the steps leading to the kitchen. “Come on in, but please keep it down. Gen just got to sleep a little bit ago.”
“Is she okay?” Martha asked.
“Yeah, she’s okay, but it’s been a zoo in here through the night, with FBI agents and the local law, then I came in here bringing Tom and Izzy.”
Peggy and her mother walked into the kitchen, where Izzy sat with a cup of coffee. “Hey, Peggy.”
“Hey Izzy. Doesn’t this just suck?” Peggy came to sit down next to the girl who had been Etta’s roommate for the past year. “I mean, it’s good to see you again, but not like this.”
“I know.” For the first time, a tear started dripping down Izzy’s cheek, and she swiped at it with the back of her hand. “I don’t know what I’ll do without her, Peggy.”
“Hey, hey.” Peggy grabbed one of Izzy’s hands from her face and held tight on her hand within her own. “You won’t have to, okay? She’ll come back. I know it. I can feel it.”
“You can, huh?” Izzy sniffed her stuffy nose.
“Yup, we’ve got a connection, me and Etta. We’re blood, you know. I’d know it if she wasn’t okay. She’s probably scared and fighting mad, but she’ll come out of this okay.” She shook Izzy’s hand again. “I take it Tom is out looking for her?”
“Yeah, have you heard it all? How that fucker sent her scarf to Tom on Isle Royale? Can you believe that shit?”
“Yeah, mom talked to Gen earlier. As soon as I heard, we came tearing down here. I think I set a speed record for the trip to Iowa.” She gave Izzy a wry grin.
“Oh, I’m sure. No tickets?”
“Nope. Made it through clean this time. I really don’t want a repeat drive like that anytime soon though.” Peggy looked across the room at her mother. “Hey, mom, how about we say a quick prayer, then get some coffee?”
Martha and Peggy grabbed the hands of Etta’s father and Izzy, each other’s hands and led the group in a earnest prayer for Etta’s safe return and for the safety of the men and women who were working so diligently to search for her.